Ordained against all odds

Janine Denomme 1965-2010

May 23, 2010|By Daarel Burnette II, TRIBUNE REPORTER

Janine Denomme wouldn't give up on the Catholic Church. She had wanted to be a priest all of her life. But she knew the church wouldn't ordain her as a female and a homosexual in a long-term relationship with another woman.

"There's something about the ritual that's culturally in my blood," she was recently quoted in the Tribune as saying. "I cannot not be a Catholic."

Last month, she was ordained by the Roman Catholic Womenpriests, a group of excommunicated bishops and female priests who are trying to get the church to open clergy ranks to women and married people. After being ordained a deacon last summer, Ms. Denomme was also excommunicated from the church.

Ms. Denomme, 45, died of colon cancer at her home in Edgewater on Monday, May 17.

Because of the ordination, her local parish wouldn't allow her to have a funeral mass there, her friends and family said. A service was held at First United Methodist Church in Evanston.

Ms. Denomme grew up in Detroit two blocks from her local parish. Although mass bored many children, Ms. Denomme was fascinated with it.

Ms. Denomme attended the University of Detroit Mercy, where she majored in religious studies. She went on to get a Ph.D. in American studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Ms. Denomme then moved to Chicago with the Jesuit Volunteer Corps to work with homeless women. She also worked as a teacher at St. Scholastica Academy and DePaul University.

She always longed to be a priest, friends and family said.

"What Janine could contribute was her writings and her music and her reading of sacred ritual," said her partner, Nancy Katz. "She was able to share that palpable love. She'd ask really profound questions about life and death. And how God holds and sustains us."

She often struggled with the church's stance on homosexuality.

"Janine would have said that love is not wrong," Katz, 54, said. "(Whether) you love a man or a woman, love is a gift from God."

"Janine was a true committed Catholic to her bones," Katz said. "She sought the vocation as a priest but unfortunately the church doesn't recognize women as priests. It was a deep struggle for Janine."

Ms. Denomme enjoyed playing the guitar and singing.

"She had a wonderful sense of humor," said Katz, who met Ms. Denomme in 2003 while she was teaching at DePaul. "She had such grace. She's one of the kindest people you'll ever meet. She's tender, sweet and funny. She was a wonderful partner."

At her ordination last month, Ms. Denomme was surrounded by 30 of her relatives.

"I know without any doubt that I am a priest, with or without this ordination," she was quoted as saying in a Tribune profile. "No matter what the official Catholic Church teaching is, they simply cannot dictate whom the Holy Spirit calls."

At the time, she had Stage 4 cancer in her colon and doctors found it had spread to her liver.

Most recently, Ms. Denomme served as the director of youth programs at the Center on Halsted, a nonprofit that serves lesbians, gays and transsexuals.

She resigned in June of last year after her cancer made her too weak to work.

Ms. Denomme is survived by her mother Mary Joan, father, Robert, brothers Mark, Joseph and David and her grandfather, Earl VanWassenhove.